It is known to make decorative elements, such as jewelry, that comprise several precious stones assembled to one another inside a closed frame, said stones thus forming a whole, one of the faces of which being a decorative face. The fastening means for these stones into the frame can in particular be made invisible on the decorative face and thus, except for professionals, such a construction is surprising in that it does not allow to discern which are the means used on such decorative elements for assembling the stones to one another.
In fact, the frame of this type of decorative elements thus generally comprises a rear face having stone fastening means that remain visible. The rear face can therefore not constitute a second decorative face such as is provided by the front face, which in no way shows the fastening means enabling the stones to be assembled.
Patent application US2004/0182110 A1, published on 23 Sep. 2004 in the name of Haim Giladi, describes an embodiment of a decorative element of the aforementioned type, being an example in which the fastening means of the stones extend in the shape of partitions from the edges and from the bottom of the frame. The partitions intersect with one another so as to define elementary frames that each receives one of the stones constituting the decorative element. The central elementary frame is that which is delimited by the greatest surface and it thus holds the largest stone, whilst the peripheral elementary frames receive stones of smaller size.
Patent FR764.966 published on 31 May 1934 in the name of the company Van Cleef & Arpels describes another example of an embodiment of a decorative element, being an example in which the stone fastening means are constituted by rails extending, in parallel to one another, between two opposite sides of the frame. The stone edges are slightly notched so as to form grooves and, thus, the stones can be slid on the rails through the aforementioned grooves. As long as the stones are contiguous, the stone fastening means are thus partly or entirely concealed from view since they are at least partly inside the stones.
This patent provides for the rails to be in the shape of a T or of rods, flat or round. It has thus been possible to make decorative elements in which the transverse section of the rails is in the shape of a T. The two upper wings of each T-shaped rail are each slid into the groove of one stone whilst the core of the T, perpendicular to said wings, consequently extends between two neighboring stones, at the level of the latter's base. In these embodiments, the rails are thus entirely concealed from view as regards the front, or upper, face of the decorative element. However, the rails remain visible from the rear, or lower, face of the decorative element, with the free extremities of the T cores being in fact visible between the stones' bases. The attempt has furthermore been made to achieve decorative elements along the same principle in which the rails are flat or round rods, but such embodiments were immediately abandoned inasmuch as they proved insufficiently resistant from a mechanical point of view. The stones become disunited under the slightest pressure exerted onto them. It will be easily understood that this weakness is due to the fact that the rails are flat or round, that they no longer have cores like the T-shaped rails do and that thus the parts of the rails onto which the stone bases come to rest are no longer present. Now, it is the different bearing of the stone bases on the rails of the T-shaped cores that provide all their strength to the decorative elements built after the year 1934 according to patent FR764966.